The present invention relates to an art of a schedule management system and recording medium. More specifically, this invention relates to the schedule management system, wherein a request, acceptance and adjustment of a work are made when two or more works allocated to a group are done by two or more workers belonging to the group and schedules for the whole group and each worker are managed and the recording medium recorded in a computer program that can cause a computer to function the schedule management system.
Conventionally, the schedule management system, wherein a schedule for each worker belonging to a group and the like is adjusted and two or more works are done, has been disclosed in JP-A-6378/1993 "Schedule Management System" (referred to as Document 1, hereinafter). The Document 1, disclosed the schedule management system comprising the means of managing a schedule for each worker belonging to a group, the means of inquiring of another schedule management system on the network about a schedule and the means of responding to the inquiry from another schedule management system. As a result, free time of each worker in the schedule and a schedule for a meeting room can be retrieved so as to decide a meeting date and check the work progress of other workers.
The main purpose of the schedule management system in the Document 1 is to support the progress and management of the recorded work provided that the information on the work done by each worker is recorded. That is, the art is used to support scheduling on the condition that the work has been allocated to each worker.
However, as a matter of fact, one work is not always specifically allocated to one worker in everyday office work. Therefore, a work has to be allocated to a worker who can surely carry out any urgent work. On the other hand, when receiving a request for a new work, a requestee who takes the work has to consider his/her recorded schedule and inform whether he/she can accept the work request or not. Therefore, as disclosed in Document 1, disclosing the progress of the recorded work to other workers is not useful enough for scheduling in a group comprising two or more workers. It is necessary that decision of the proper worker for the work and selection of a new work has to be supported.
The purpose of the present invention is to solve the above-mentioned problems.
Moreover, the purpose of this invention is to provide a schedule management system that comprises the retrieval function of retrieving the proper requestee and the work allocation function of allocating a work by negotiation between the allocator and the requestee, and supports decision of the proper requestee for the work and selection of newly accepted work.
Furthermore, the purpose of this invention is to provide the schedule management system wherein the work load is displayed to the allocator and the requestee in order that the work schedule can be adjusted to balance busy time and free time.
In addition, the purpose of this invention is to provide a recording medium storing a computer program in which the above-mentioned schedule management system is executed.
The schedule management system of the present invention comprises the communication means of communicating with another schedule management system on the network as well as the schedule management means of managing a schedule of each worker who is a user, and further more comprises the negotiation means of negotiating the work conditions such as a deadline between the schedule management systems belonging to the allocator who allocates the work and the requestee who is the user. Therefore, the requestee does not unconditionally accept the work allocation put on by the allocator but both the allocator and the requestee can allocate and accept the work respectively by mutual agreement. The schedule management system further comprises the evaluation means of evaluating how busy the worker feels (referred to as the work load, hereinafter) based on the recorded each worker's schedule and the calculation means of calculating the completion day of the newly allocated work based on the evaluation result. As a result, the allocator can retrieve the proper requestee who surely meets the work deadline presented by the allocator. As described above, the conventional schedule management system is performed provided that the work has been allocated to each worker. On the contrary, the present management system further comprises the retrieval means of retrieving the proper requestee and the work allocation means of allocating the work by negotiation between the allocator and the requestee in order to support decision of the proper requestee for the work and selection of the newly accepted work. Moreover, the work load is disclosed to the allocator and the requestee who is the user therefore the each worker's schedule can be adjusted to balance the worker's busy time and free time.